Qana Questions
Confederate Yankee has been raising a lot of questions about Qana. Go to his main page and keep scrolling.
I haven’t had the time to assess the validity of Confederate Yankee’s questions. But apparently, he’s having an impact.
Allah Bryan at Hot Air asks: where were the men? [UPDATE: In comments, Allah says they were there — but like everything else, it’s a fluid question. The locals pointed photographers to the women and children, of course.]
I’m with Allah: “As with Haditha, no one on the right wants to believe what happened at Qana happened the way the media says it did. But … it might have.” It’s still a fluid story; the proximity of Hezbollah to the building remains an open question, depending on how you define “near.”
The key is to keep our eyes open at all times.
Bryan wrote that post, not me.
From what I understand, of the 56 bodies recovered, 12 were women and 34 were children. Which means 10 were men. No mystery as to where they were.
Although now that the body count has been revised down to 28(!), the question becomes viable again.
Allah (6c15ca) — 8/2/2006 @ 6:56 amAs I note at my blog today, Robert Fisk provides some evidence to back up some of Confederate Yankee’s problems with the phots
Francis (c2679c) — 8/2/2006 @ 7:16 amAnd the follow up questions become: What happened to the other 28 bodies and how did they manage to count 34 children among 28 dead?
Someone is making stuff up.
Pablo (efa871) — 8/2/2006 @ 8:32 amThis is a mildly interesting side-note to a more pervasive problem: How do modern militaries respond to unconventional asymetric warfare when their opponents willfully use civilians as cover / concealment / human shields for their assaults?
Hezbollah (from the accounts I’ve read) seems to have been very succesful at forcing the IDF into inflicting significant civilian (and UN observer) casualties simply by staging their rocket attacks near civilian (and UN) populations. Although its hard to tell, my impression is that Hezbollah in many ways is getting the political upper hand with this tactic.
At the beginning of the conflict many arab states were very quiet on the conflict or even condemned Hezbollah for initiating the conflict (plus many arab states have other reasons not to like Hezbollah). Hezbollah has managed to turn much of the opinion of the arab world to focus on the civilian casualties inflicted by the IDF now.
Unless Israel is truly able to inflict severe damage to Hezbollah, they may actually come out of this worse than when they started. Hezbollah will still be able to stage rocket attacks, and they will have emerged as a bigger political player with more of a say in what happens in the Middle East. Plus they will have managed to stand up to the IDF (even if only symbolically) which is something no arab military has been able to do without being completely destroyed by the IDF.
C Student (59bfb8) — 8/2/2006 @ 12:01 pmCStudent identifies the problem. The solution is to eject Hezbollah’s UN allies from Lebanon and install a well armed peacekeeping force, likely NATO troops from Europe, tasked to kill the terrorists. The IDF should remain in advanced positions and continue to attack the terrorists until NATO forces can begin military operations against Hezbollah and their sponsors, including preparations to invade Syria. It may take a few weeks to get ready.
At the same time the US should begin to position troops for the invasion of Iran. When ready, NATO can attack Damascus at the same time the US attacks Tehran. Meanwhile, the IDF can deal with Hizbollah. It won’t cure all the region’s ills, but it will make for a good start.
Black Jack (d8da01) — 8/2/2006 @ 2:08 pmBlack Jack: I like your goals but you’re dreaming if you think a NATO force will go after hezbollah.
steve sturm (b5aa23) — 8/2/2006 @ 2:14 pmYeah right. Keep up the conspiracy, folks.
I guess you didn’t read that Israel’s own army now pretty much says there were no missile launches from that area, and that it was more than likely a mistake.
Then there’s the pic of a red cross ambulance with a missile hole blown right through the cross on top.
Obviously alot of Hezbollah’s actions are terroristic. But innocent lebanese women and children are not hezbollah.
According to an Israeli Jewish Leader, there is no such thing as innocents amongst one’s enemies. If hezbollah shoots missiles at Israel, that’s terrorism. If Israel shoots missiles at innocent Lebonese, what’s that, liberation? I guess it only goes one way – only the people you personally support are given a moral pass by you to kill innocents.
Shorter Rightwing Meanies (e92581) — 8/2/2006 @ 2:39 pmI would also like to add – there are idiots who claim there were no men found among the victims. Here’s proof that is not true:
pic 1
pic 2
pic 3
Those are clearly adult men in those pictures.
Shorter Rightwing Meanies (e92581) — 8/2/2006 @ 2:44 pmAh, yes, the infamous stripped down “Red Cross Ambulance” with a hole where the siren was removed, which seems to have been struck by bombs/missiles on at least 3 separate occasions now — what an unlucky vehicle!
(Dan Riehl has that one pretty well covered here.)
Personally, I think that the Hezb’Allahpologists aren’t giving the Israelis nearly enough credit for bringing so many innocent dead civilians back to life. I mean, really, for days we were inundated with stories of how horrible the Israelis were because of the 56 killed at Qana, and now there’s only 28 dead! Since we all know that the terrorists wouldn’t lie about the number of people killed — and they certainly wouldn’t truck in bodies from a nearby morgue just for a few propaganda pics — what other explanation is there other than THE JEWS HAVE MASTERED THE ART OF RESURRECTION!
Shad (964013) — 8/2/2006 @ 3:18 pmss, why is that, what real fighting man wouldn’t step up and volunteer to exterminate the Hezbollah vermin? These cowards hide behind women and children, then yell and scream like little girls when they get exactly what they asked for. Hezbollah put those people in harm’s way, the terrorists are guilty of the massacre, no one else is responsible for their crimes against humanity but them. I’d think honorable men would proud to rid the world of such despicable swine.
BTW, don’t try to pass off shoddy goods. Pics 1 and 3 are the same, only taken from different angles.
Black Jack (d8da01) — 8/2/2006 @ 3:52 pm“I guess it only goes one way – only the people you personally support are given a moral pass by you to kill innocents.”
First – I wasn’t making any kind of moral argument only a strategic observation of the difficulty of countering a terrorist organization that purposefully uses civilian populations as a shield to complicate any response by a traditional military force.
Second – There is a big moral difference between the IDF and Hezbollah. Hezbollah deliberately targets civilian populations because they dont’ have the military might to go toe to toe with the IDF. They also purposefully conduct their operations in and around civilian populations to make it difficult for the IDF to shoot back.
The IDF is at least attempting to target Hezbollah, even if they are inflicting civilian casualties as a result. They are not purposefully killing civilians just to inflict terror on Lebannon (if they were, the civilian death tolls would be quite a bit higher given IDF air superiority and modern anti-personnel munitions). Indeed civilian deaths are actually counter productive for the IDF’s strategic goals. Also the IDF doesn’t hide among Israel’s civilian population – course that doesn’t stop Hezbollah from targeting civilian populations.
Any way you slice it Hezbollah is a terrorist organization. So much so that some Arab countries (primarily Egypt and Saudi Arabia)initially pressed Syria to break ties with Hezbollah.
C Student (59bfb8) — 8/2/2006 @ 5:11 pmI couldn’t find an email for you, but I wanted to let you know that your RSS feed is part of something new at blognetnews.com/california. Head on over and take a look. We hope you’ll like what you see.
Best,
Dave Mastio
David Mastio (c02271) — 8/2/2006 @ 5:38 pmThat’s bullshit.
There were a lot of questions raised by the initial reporting. Some of those questions have been answered, refuting some ideas of a possible conspiracy.
Good.
And we know now that it wasn’t 54 people killed, but approximately half that number.
Again, good.
And we know for damn sure that the Israelis didn’t deliberately target women and children. Kind of hard to do that when you don’t know they’re even there.
Could it have just been an unfortunate case of wrong place, wrong time, in a war zone? Yes. That was my immediate take on it. Now that some of the initial incorrect reports are being sorted out, that is tending to be my take on it again.
Do I “not want to believe”? No. I want to know what happened.
Pixy Misa (90abdc) — 8/2/2006 @ 7:38 pmI totally agree. Why is admitting one possibility “bullshit”?
Patterico (50c3cd) — 8/2/2006 @ 7:57 pmSorry. It’s the first sentence I was referring to:
That’s overbroad, a mischaracterisation of what has been written, and is acribing motives to those writings without any reasonable foundation.
I guess I should have said that instead of “bullshit”. 😉
Pixy Misa (90abdc) — 8/2/2006 @ 8:36 pmThe Israelis are trying to fight Clinton style and found their Chinese embassy. They need to go in on the ground and root the rats out of their holes. Olmert tried to do it on the cheap, like Clinton and now will have to accept a weak hand or change his plan.
In the meantime, AP is trying very hard not to offend Muslims. Try to find the word Muslim in that article.
Mike K (416363) — 8/2/2006 @ 8:38 pmascribing motives…
ECIMF. (Editable comments is my friend. Um…)
Pixy Misa (90abdc) — 8/2/2006 @ 8:38 pmI would like to point out, and I think this bears much repeating, that Hizballah is a civilian militia. You cannot fight Hizballah without killing civilians. No one has been able to explain to me how they distinguish innocent civilian corpses from Hizballah civilian corpses.
B Moe (2cbcfb) — 8/2/2006 @ 9:33 pmThey don’t. Those are all innocent civilians.
Pablo (08e1e8) — 8/3/2006 @ 3:14 amNo one has been able to explain to me how they distinguish innocent civilian corpses from Hizballah civilian corpses.
Moronic brownshirt fucks don’t care. As long as there’s a picture of a corpse to jerk off to…
dave (2eda4d) — 8/3/2006 @ 5:34 amWhat? No FPP of your shenanigans? Cripes, just what is the matter with you people? You have spent the night making it abundantly clear that you are incapable of debating issues, therefore without a name or identity you have nothing to attack, not even character. I may have a cynical view of others, but today I am pleased more than ever with my friends and acquaintances, for your repeated, juvenile attempts at obfuscation last night reminded me that I left my peers as pathetic as you in high school.
dgbellak (f8adc2) — 8/3/2006 @ 5:52 amdave, absolutely.
Anti-Israel types, Hizp’allahgists, much of the Left these days, coupled with some of the paleo-cons of the Buchanan sort, definitely seem to be delighted whenever there’s a chance to blame Israel for civilian corpses.
Lurking Observer (ea88e8) — 8/3/2006 @ 5:54 amPersonally, I think IDF should just mow ’em all down & let God sort ’em out. It worked in WWII.
sharon (03e82c) — 8/3/2006 @ 7:32 amThursday Wingnut Roundup…
Well, somebody has to keep an eye on them: All Things Beautiful – all those dead bodies in Lebanon? Ha! A Hezbollah PR Jedi mind trick, and the MSM just laps it up – just keep showing us the same…
AGITPROP: Version 3.0, Featuring Blogenfreude (72c8fd) — 8/3/2006 @ 8:23 amActually Sharon, I just heard reference on the radio to the question whether western society can no longer match the ruthlessness of our enemies in order to win a war like WWII. I’m not in favor of firebombing cities, but if the alternative is worse continued suffering of the country ruled by the tyrant as well as conquered countries, it’s hard not to justify if that is what it takes for self-defense . All the more reason to put tyrants down before they get too powerful (assuming they are acting “tyrantish”, of course).
As far as the situation in Qana, the thread on Confederate Yankee linked to previously describes an incident of this type that the Germans did in justifying their invasion into Poland. It is easier to write off questions as “loonatic conspiracy theories” rather than face the possibility of how wicked people people can be. How long did it take most people to believe the horrors of the Nazi Death camps? Probably not until seeing footage of Patton’s liberation of one, complete with “Old Blood and Guts” vomiting at the sight of the piled bodies.
(Whether you like Rush or not, he will play extended clips of interviews.) yesterday he had audio of two people on a Sunday show discussing how surprised they were to listen to Hezbollah’s leader and find out how anti-semetic they were!! (Where have they been? Do they not know that the terrorist groups will not be satisifed by anything less than Israel’s destruction?)
MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 8/3/2006 @ 10:40 amWe do not have the stomach to win wars like WWII today. And with televisions wars, civilians get the pictures instantly and don’t like seeing women and children hurt or killed. Do they honestly think this is the first time in history that women and children died in war?
No, we have Congressmen accusing our soldiers of murder, staged pics of dead bodies, terrorists shooting from residential neighborhoods, etc., etc. We don’t have the stomach to fight all of that. And the terrorists know it.
sharon (03e82c) — 8/3/2006 @ 11:15 amFolks, this kill is nowhere near fresh. I mean, freezer burn or rot, that kid is well past his “use by” date.
(Wonder how many times he got counted.)
Alan Kellogg (b104a7) — 8/3/2006 @ 8:59 pm